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A Catholic Lent feature with a 2009 Lenten calendar updated daily from Ash Wednesday through Holy Week and Good Friday.

Seasonal Features
Lent

Franciscan Communications: YouTube for Lent
Lenten Catholic Treasures with Father Greg Friedman, O.F.M.
“What Are Catholics Doing for Lent?”
“Lent Is a Catholic Thing”

Lenten Radio Retreat
Experience a Franciscan Radio Retreat this Lent, led each week by a Catholic bishop. Listen to inspiring words and songs for Sunday Lenten reflection either online or offline with your iPod. Take this opportunity to focus clearly on your spiritual journey to the Resurrection each week—beginning Ash Wednesday.

Sunday Soundbites
What Is Lent?
First Sunday of Lent—Good or Evil
Second Sunday of Lent—Say Yes to God
Third Sunday of Lent—Living Water
Fourth Sunday of Lent—Seeing the Light
Fifth Sunday of Lent—Our Final Moments
Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion—An End to Hatred


Lent 2009 News
The AmericanCatholic.org Lent news feature focuses on coverage of the ongoing events of the lenten season from the Vatican and throughout the world that runs from Ash Wednesday, Feb. 25, until the Easter triduum, marking the days of Jesus’ passion and Resurrection, and through Easter Sunday, April 12.

FAQs About Lent
Why do Catholics fast and give things up during Lent? Why are there ashes on Ash Wednesday and palms on Palm Sunday? When does Lent end? Find the answers to these and other frequently asked questions here.

Day by Day Through Lent: Fasting From Our Clutter
Reflect on clearing clutter from your life this season of Lent. This Catholic Update offers ways to fast from our personal habits, the clutter in our homes, our spiritual clutter and the confusion of our culture as we prepare for Easter.

Stations of the Cross
The Stations of the Cross are a Catholic custom of Lent that commemorates the passion of Jesus on Good Friday.

More Lenten Inspiration
Mardi Gras: Catholic Roots, Carnival and Ordinary Time
Agony in the Garden: Understanding Jesus’ Passion
Ash Wednesday: Church Customs, Penance and Bible Readings
Lent: More Than Penance, by Archbishop Daniel E. Pilarczyk
Triduum Rituals: Washing of the Feet, Veneration of the Cross and Baptism

Lenten and Easter e-cards

New! Lenten Resources
‘Terra Sancta: A Pilgrim’s Guide to the Holy Land’
Explore the holy places of Jesus’ life, death and Resurrection. The Holy Land represents the birthplace of Christianity. This guide offers a city by city, site by site “armchair pilgrimage” through the land of the Bible. Listen to a clip from the DVD here.

Confronting Illusion
Lent is a time of self-reflection, of holding up a spiritual mirror in which to view ourselves and our world. In this excerpt from introductory volume of the St. Anthony Messenger Press eight-book “Called to Holiness: Spirituality for Catholic Women” series, Making Sense of God, Elizabeth Dreyer guides us to look inward, to confront the illusions in our lives and see where change is needed.

Paid Advertisement
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Rose Philippine Duchesne: Born in Grenoble, France, of a family that was among the new rich, Philippine learned political skills from her father and a love of the poor from her mother. The dominant feature of her temperament was a strong and dauntless will, which became the material—and the battlefield—of her holiness. She entered the convent at 19 and remained despite their opposition. As the French Revolution broke, the convent was closed, and she began taking care of the poor and sick, opened a school for street urchins and risked her life helping priests in the underground. <p>When the situation cooled, she personally rented her old convent, now a shambles, and tried to revive its religious life. The spirit was gone, and soon there were only four nuns left. They joined the infant Society of the Sacred Heart, whose young superior, St. Madeleine Sophie Barat, would be her lifelong friend. In a short time Philippine was a superior and supervisor of the novitiate and a school. But her ambition, since hearing tales of missionary work in Louisiana as a little girl, was to go to America and work among the Indians. At 49, she thought this would be her work. With four nuns, she spent 11 weeks at sea en route to New Orleans, and seven weeks more on the Mississippi to St. Louis. She then met one of the many disappointments of her life. The bishop had no place for them to live and work among Native Americans. Instead, he sent her to what she sadly called "the remotest village in the U.S.," St. Charles, Missouri. With characteristic drive and courage, she founded the first free school for girls west of the Mississippi. </p><p>It was a mistake. Though she was as hardy as any of the pioneer women in the wagons rolling west, cold and hunger drove them out—to Florissant, Missouri, where she founded the first Catholic Indian school, adding others in the territory. "In her first decade in America, Mother Duchesne suffered practically every hardship the frontier had to offer, except the threat of Indian massacre—poor lodging, shortages of food, drinking water, fuel and money, forest fires and blazing chimneys, the vagaries of the Missouri climate, cramped living quarters and the privation of all privacy, and the crude manners of children reared in rough surroundings and with only the slightest training in courtesy" (Louise Callan, R.S.C.J., <i>Philippine Duchesne</i>). </p><p>Finally, at 72, in poor health and retired, she got her lifelong wish. A mission was founded at Sugar Creek, Kansas, among the Potawatomi. She was taken along. Though she could not learn their language, they soon named her "Woman-Who-Prays-Always." While others taught, she prayed. Legend has it that Native American children sneaked behind her as she knelt and sprinkled bits of paper on her habit, and came back hours later to find them undisturbed. She died in 1852 at the age of 83.</p> What should I do about my son’s Jewish wedding? O Wisdom of our God Most High, guiding creation with power and love: Come to teach us the path of knowledge!

 
PICK OF THE DAY
DVD! The World of St. Francis
The World of St. Francis: Past, Present and Future includes three programs on the life, times and influence of St. Francis.

 
CATHOLIC GREETINGS
Thanksgiving
In America, Thanksgiving is one of the rare times when religion and civics intersect. Let us always give thanks and praise ...



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